Charley Charles/Photos Siwer Ohlsson

A 100% genuine gasser, the way they were really built in the late 60’s – that was the goal for Mike Hedqvist from Sweden. It took him eight years to collect all the necessary parts, and the result is a roadster that would have fit in perfectly at the drag strip in Bakersfield 40 years ago.

"I got into this stuff pretty much like everybody else, starting with plastic models. Plus I’ve seen “American Graffiti” probably a hundred times – that f***ing movie has ruined my life…"

Watching a dude like Phil Luken in his Ford Topolino with an iron Hemi on regular gas, seven-second runs with the front wheels in the air for the first hundred yards, that’s the kind of stuff that could make a man religious...

The next source of inspiration also came from sunny California. Mike paid a visit to the legendary Joe Reath, who used to run a speed shop in Long Beach (he’s retired now). Reath recommended the perfect specs for an authentic 60’s style racing motor for gasoline, with stuff like shorter stroke for more RPM, X-large combustion chambers and tons of compression. Mike bought the engine case, heads, crankshaft and some other stuff from Reath. Another “must-have” was the Hilborn injection, as well as a Scintilla Vertex magneto.

But what the heck, hasn’t there been some progress in the last four decades? Why mess around with this troublesome old crap? We try to provoke Mike a little to maybe get an interesting answer, and he doesn’t disappoint us.

"The new stuff works too good! When an engine runs too well, it doesn’t sound right – it needs to run a little rough to get the sound I want. Some people ask me why I didn’t choose a side-valve engine but that was never an option. They can be nice to look at, but the technology is too much Fred Flintstone for my taste."

The hardest ingredients to find were the Goodyear tires and the magnesium wheels from Halibrand in Culver City, California. Mike had to buy the rear slicks complete with a pair of five-spoke American Racing wheels, and carefully cut the rims apart to get the ancient tires off without damaging them.

"That felt pretty terrible, but I try to comfort myself with the fact that those wheels were in a really sorry shape. I bought the wheels from another one of the old legends, by the way – John Mazmanian."

 It took a lot of time to find all the right parts, but Mike refused to make any compromises. The hydraulic clutch could be seen as a deviation from the 60’s theme, but Mike feels that if Mickey Thompson used one in his funny car in 1968, so could he. But yours truly gets him off balance for a second by pointing out that the Harley-Davidson front discs don’t fit in 100% – I happen to know that Harleys didn’t get disc brakes until 1973!

"Shit, what are you telling me? Oh man, I think you’re right… oh well, let’s say the style is late 60’s and early 70’s then!"

Mike let the project take the time it needed, all the time taking care of his regular daytime job. He runs a one-man company where he rebuilds cars for disabled people, converting them to hand clutch, hand gas and that kind of thing.

" But in the future I hope I can make a living just wrenching on American cars. Working for the government can be a drag sometimes, the good old down-to-earth car buffs are a lot easier to deal with."

The hardest part was adjusting the Hilborn mechanical fuel injection, Mike says.

"It would have been easy to just slap a Holley on it and everything would have worked out fine – but that would have been cheating! I won’t give up that easy. But at one point, flames shot up from the breathers, it turned into a pretty big fire and I thought the car would burn to the ground, but I managed to put it out."

 Well into the summer of 2008, Mike still hadn’t gotten his gasser up and running, but he still took it to a drag race down south to keep on wrenching there and maybe get it finished in time for a few runs down the strip. Finally she fired right up with an ear-splitting roar. This little thing is so loud you wouldn’t believe it. Heavy rain stopped any attempts at taking it to the quarter mile, though.

"Max RPM is around 8,000 and I think she should be good for a 10-second run. I’d say I have 400 honest horsepower, maybe 450. It sounds like 1,000 but that’s another story…"

At the race, Mike also met some geezer who was at least as much of a fanatic as himself, something he would have thought impossible.

"He came up to me with the comment: “Well, I see you have managed to find the right old Packard 440 ignition cables”. Those were the cables everybody used back in the 60s, I found a whole roll of the stuff on eBay and bought it right away."

Apart from a try-out run or two on the strip, Mike has no plans for serious racing with his Boneshaker. 60’s style also means 60’s level of safety – and back then, there were lots of casualties. He plans to have some fun with his roadster in the summer of 2009 and then maybe put it up for sale.

"I am dreaming of rolling into the Hot Rod Reunion in Bakersfield and check out the reactions, then maybe leave the car with a Swedish friend in Long Beach to try to sell it. It would be nice if it could stay in Sweden, but the right buyer will probably be an American, Mike says – but when I try to make him name a precise dollars-and-cents figure, he just grins and says it’s almost impossible to put a price tag on his creation. I guess the guy can’t stand the thought of parting with it. Not yet, anyway."

And of course there will be new projects, although not with Mike himself as the owner but cars for others. His next two creations will be a five-window coupe and a front-engine dragster with a 392 iron Hemi.

The dragster will get some really serious late 60’s style too. That was when everything looked the best, if you ask me. It’s not like everything was better in the old days – but it sure was a lot more fun!

TECH SHEET

Owner/builder: Mike Hedqvist, Piteå, Sweden
Wheelbase: 110”

Weight: 850 kilos

Frame: Ford 1932, chopped in rear

Body: Fiberglass

Grille: Ford 1932

Engine: 1968 Chevy small block

Displacement: 331 cu. in.

Bore and stroke: 3,48 x 3,25”